When Two Pieces Become One
by NeverGonnaStop
Summary: Harry died that day in the Chamber of Secrets. The piece of Voldemort's soul inside of him leapt to the only living thing in the room, taking with it all of Harry's memories, hopes and dreams. Memories that would become Tom Riddle's curse. One hero died that day. Another was born from the ashes to fight the battle against his older counterpart and his ilk. To undo his sins.
1. 1: These Memories are Your Curse

**Chapter 1:**

 **These Memories are Your Curse**

* * *

Tom stared at the bodies lying before him.

They were so very small, nought but looked so peaceful lying there.

The final trickle of life left them, wiping away the last vestiges of his incorporeal. As he became wholly flesh once more, so too did the world around him grow tangible.

His heart beat for the first time in the decades since he sealed his fractured soul in the diary. The blood in his veins was warm again, as warm as the tears cascading down his cheeks.

"No." He cried out as the foreign memories flooded his mind. Memories that were both his and yet not his.

Everything Harry had experienced in life, and in death, came to him. He remembered how he had punished Dudley at the reptile exhibit, just as he'd punished Billy Stubbs for feeding Helvetica to his rabbit. He remember the cruel words and apathy of his aunt and uncle, almost as cold as the apathy of those public _'servants'_ who took jobs at the orphanage for the sick pleasure of being in control of people weaker than them.

A stepping stone to their precious future careers in politics or social care.

"Harry? Ginny?" He moaned again as he dropped the holly wand and fell to his knees, heedless of the slick floor of the Chamber.

Tom remembered the violence inflicted on him by his older cousin and by the even older foster siblings. How he had run and hid from the many bullies, how he'd discovered magic accidentally. But then the two sets of memories stopped echoing.

He remembered two different lives. One in which he feared his magic and tried to rationalize it, another in which he embraced it. Played with it. Experimented with and mastered it.

He remembered going to Diagon Alley for the first time. Twice. The first first time he went alone, harboring suspicion and unease. The second first time with a giant beside him giving words of kindness and tragedy.

"Don't go. I'm sorry." He pleaded as he crawled on hands and knees to kneel between the children. The dead children.

Then memories he couldn't even pretend were his own came to the fore.

Tom realized they were not Harry's memories. They belonged to something else, something inside of Harry. Something trapped in a malignant, tar-like darkness and a suffocating silence. It's only window to the world a lightning shaped crack in its prison through which it could peer and see the outside world.

He saw the shattered home and his slain mother laid on the floor. He saw the half-giant who tried so desperately to be Tom's friend when they attended Hogwarts, only to be betrayed in the end, lift him up from the rubble and wrap him in a blanket. He watched as he fell asleep looking up at an ocean of stars with the roar of a motorcycle as his lullabye.

Twelve years. Twelve years of life experienced in a fraction of a second. That is what he remembered and it was too much for him.

"I'm so sorry." Tom Riddle choked on the words as he picked the limp children up and cradled their heads in his chest.

He remembered everything. The good. The bad. Most importantly, he remembered that twisted, monstrous face protruding from the back of another man's head. The thing he was destined to become. The thing he _had_ become. The thing that had brought upon Harry - and countless other children - the same cold and loveless childhood he had suffered through.

He tried to vomit, but all his empty stomach could yield was the bile now staining his front.

Why? Why had Ginny Weasley painted Lord Voldemort as a great and powerful sorcerer when writing to him? So mighty that people dare not speak his name for fear of his wrath? That's not what he saw, not what these memories showed. What he saw was a disgusting, loathsome creature of cowardice and a parasite to boot. That Voldemort was a wretch, worthy of nothing but contempt and perhaps pity. Weak and disgusting.

That's not what he envisioned. That was not what he set out to become. That was not a man of greatness uniting the disparate magical communities into a new order.

He choked on the scream as it came out. Strange things like sadness and horror and fury are what he yelled to the heavens. His scream hit cold uncaring rock and echoed endlessly back to him. Weak, ineffectual and as pointless as his attempts to rouse the two children back from the dead by shaking them.

These emotions were not his own. Unlike the disgust and shame at what he saw, these emotions were filling him from the outside but just like the memories he couldnt parse the two apart.

In that moment of despair, disgust, horror and rage a smidgeon of another feeling, one entirely new to Tom Marvolo Riddle, peaked through the mass of emotions tearing at his insides. A smidgeon of remorse in a typhoon of anger and sadness blossomed.

A smidgeon is all that was needed.

In that moment two broken pieces of a soul became one and Tom Riddle knew nothing else but pain.

* * *

Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore lead his contemporaries through the rubble.

Minerva, Severus, Pomona and Filius followed him with wands drawn. Poppy took up the rear carrying a rucksack nearly as large as she was. It was filled with bandages, healing salves and potions of esoteric medical application.

He kept the charms professor and potions master close, making sure that he was flanked by the only two people in a thousand miles with more skill in their respective professions than he had. Save for Pomfrey.

Professors Sprout and Mcgonagall flanked the school healer and had orders to close off the entrance with herbological and transfiguration magic should the first three fall.

He would have had Minerva at his side in place of Filius were it not for the fact that his own skills at transfiguration were far superior to hers and the strategic advantages of having a charms master and someone knowledgeable of the dark arts taking point with him over a fellow master of transfiguring.

At least that's what he told the young(er) woman, knowing that the truth of his chivalrous designs would only infuriate her and his other fair companions.

They reached something like a vault door. It stood ajar and they carefully surrounded the sides, Flitwick ducking low to keep out of sight as he dashed to the other end and Severus taking the right.

With his two pointmen pressed against the sides of the vault door, Albus walked through the gaping portal and into a massive, truly awe-inspiring chamber

He squashed the childlike giddiness and desire to explore before it could rise up. The serpent statues, the elephantine pipeways, the smooth artisan floor and ceiling. They all begged him to investigate, but he refused those feelings in lieu of the urgent matter at hand.

They descended a steel ladder one at a time, the others keeping their wands at the ready to defend or catch their climbing partners at a moment's notice. He instructed the back three to remain near the vault door to make sure it remained open and to prevent anything from sneaking up on them, thus securing an escape route.

The three combat-hardened wizards sulked between the basilisk statues with no shortage of apprehension. Any one of them could be the real thing, and Albus was positive he wasn't the only one who didn't like their chances against the beast mister Weasley warned them about.

Even with the help of the other professors they were woefully unprepared to take down such a creature.

Flip. Thunk. Flip. Thunk.

Albus raised a hand to stop his companions. He recognized the first sound as pages in a book turning. The second was more difficult to place.

He motioned for the other two to take cover behind the statues on either side of him and they obeyed. Severus waded into the rancid, waist-high water without a sound. The poor part-goblin found himself completely submerged in the sewage but paddled along anyways.

In a less tense situation Albus would have chuckled at his old dueling opponent's misfortune. Instead he showed a modicum of professionalism and merely grinned like a Cheshire cat as the trio advanced.

That smile vanished at the horrific scene before him. It wasn't every day a wizard, headmaster or no, laid eyes on a millenia-old basilisk. The sight of the felled beast brought a great deal of relief and hope for the safety of his students, but that relief and hope soon vanished; replaced with sadness and despair at the smaller figures beside it.

He recognized two as Harry Potter and Ginevra Weasley. The third was larger and a few meters further away. He had his back to them.

Flip. Thunk. Flip. Thunk.

The young man was kneeling over something. A book by the sound of it. A book whose pages he turned before bringing something large and white down on it in a stabbing motion. A phoenix, his phoenix, stood next to the man with it's head on his shoulder, letting loose the occasional trill like a mother cooing her child.

Albus kept his wand trained on the young man, who he recognized must have been an upperclassman, sixth or seventh year. He couldn't tell who from this position or distance.

He crept closer.

Flip. Thunk. Flip. Thunk .

He crept closer still, and when he reached the two children he motioned for Severus and Filius to remain hidden.

Flip. Thunk. Flip. Thunk.

Albus reached down with his free hand, not daring to peel his eyes away from the mystery man in front of him.

He checked Ginny Weasley for any sign of life, but could feel no breath from her mouth, pulse from her neck or heat on her skin. Hoping against hope he pushed his magic into her body to see if her own internal magic would reject it, like a magnet repelling another of the same kind.

It wasn't the easiest way of checking to see if somebody was alive, and only truly powerful wizards could attempt such a trick, and only then to check if there was any chance of resuscitation or revival.

Nothing.

His magic passed through her dead body like any other lifeless matter. He did the same for Harry, skipping the regular breath, pulse and body heat checks. Again. Nothing.

Flip. Thunk.

Albus motioned again for the others to hold their positions before indicating that the two students were dead. He motioned for them to stay again when he heard the splash of Severus taking a step forward.

He felt the potions master tap on his occlumency shields with his own legilimency as he often did when asking permission to speak privately via the mind arts. Even with his shields up he could sense the fury and desperation of the man and desire to confirm with his own senses what his headmaster claimed. Albus ignored it and approached the kneeling teenager.

The only thing preventing him from killing the figure then and there was not his desire to know what happened, but the sight of Fawks crying on his shoulder. The poor bird never could understand that it's tears weren't capable of healing those kinds of injuries.

Albus had never known him to shed a tear for the undeserving.

Flip.

Albus tensed as the young man raised his arm to stab the leather-bound book again, but stopped mid-swing. He was close enough now to recognize the thing in his hands as an ivory tooth. A fang previously belonging to the basilisk, no doubt.

Before he could wonder what a perfectly unused journal had done to deserve such harsh treatment the man, the boy, turned to look at him.

"Tom?" Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore gasped as he, for the first time in a century, dropped his wand.

He picked it up again just as the puffy-eyed, red-faced and vomit-covered boy dropped his own weapon with a clatter.

"Professor?" He choked out with trembling lips.

It came out as more of a gurgle than a word as it left his throat. All theories of time anomalies, wormholes flinging students into far off futures and multiverse jumping left his mind at the sight of the Slytherin in such a vulnerable state.

Tom motioned to the two dead students as his mouth fought desperately to form words, but no sound came out.

"What are you doing here, Tom?" Albus asked in a manner as if finding an underage incarnation of the greatest dark lord in history in a legendary chamber beneath Hogwarts stabbing a nearly featureless book with a venomous fang pilfered from a recently slayed basilisk beside two dead children was a daily occurrence.

"I... I was..." He said motioning from Harry to the book. "I was trying to take it all back."

Albus understood. Someway, somehow, he understood. This sixteen year old boy, a child in his own right, wished for something he himself wished for every time he visited the man he once loved in that dreadful prison. A mulligan to undo all of the horrible things that happened in the interim he missed, or the consequences of his actions and inactions.

Thunk!

Albus jumped at the sound. He hadn't even noticed Tom retrieve the fang until he plunged it into yet another page of the seemingly unused journal.

"But I can't!" He gurgled out in his attempt at yelling, but with what came out barely above a whisper.

He left the fang buried in the pages.

"God help me! I can't take any of it back, no matter how badly I want to."

Albus dropped his wand again, this time deliberately, and swept the boy into his arms. He knew it was stupid. He knew it was unnatural and absurd. He knew, in his brain, that this couldn't be real and that if it was it shouldn't be believed. But somewhere deeper he knew holding the boy was what he was supposed to do. The right thing to do.

Tom wailed into his chest as he clawed meekly against Albus' robes and back.

"Why!?" He begged. "Why can't I take it back!"


	2. 2: Our Different Prisons

**Chapter 2:**

 **Our Different Prisons**

* * *

For the third day in a row Tom Riddle awoke in the Hogwarts hospital wing.

The madam of the wing, Pomfrey they said her name was, left a dinner tray loaded with beefy vegetable soup, a salad and cornbread beside his bed. In any other situation Tom would have glowered at the strange choice of food, but ever since his return to the living his stomach was like a bottomless pit and the soup was plenty tasty.

He fast learned to tune out the madam as he stuffed his face.

Pomfrey seemed endeared by his ability to eat so much food. After his first breakfast with her she started bringing three or four backup trays of various dishes. Wards weren't offered five course meals in the Hogwarts hospital wing when he attended the school and he was almost positive it wasn't normal for the other students trapped in sterile sheets. Of course, they were petrified and lacked the ability to eat anything at all but that was beside the point.

He suspected the old(er) woman's behavior had something to do with the fact that she had diagnosed him with severe malnutrition and told him to eat all of the food she gave him. The combination of what he recognized as the joy of seeing somebody ACTUALLY follow her instructions for once and what he thought he recognized as the desire to find something he wouldn't eat sent the woman on a mission to feed him all manner of foods. A fruitless mission.

During lunch the day before she outright asked him when the last time he ate was. Fortunately she took his honest answer of 'fifty years' as a joke.

She came to clear the tray and dishes as soon as he finished. It was then that he felt a familiar upheaval in his stomach.

"Excuse me, ma'am." he said to the woman as he squeezed past her and made his way to the lavatory on the other side of the room.

The doors to the stalls had no locks as the need to come in and resuscitate an unconscious child if the situation called for it outweighed the need for privacy. He didn't even bother closing the door as he knelt over the toilet bowl.

Ever since the faculty half-carried him to the infirmary he had difficulty keeping food down. He had no trouble getting it down, but keeping it there proved difficult. When he did manage to keep food down it didn't stay inside of him for very long but an antidiuretic potion resolved that issue. He didn't have the heart to tell the mediwitch that he had the stomach of a newborn, literally, and couldn't handle food heavier than breastmilk without the normal bacterial flora people develop naturally.

Truth be told, he just didn't fancy Hogwarts hiring a wet nurse or ordering baby formula for him, which would be the medically sound thing to do. Instead of suffering that indignity and slowly working his way up through gerber peaches, crackers, soups and breads he skipped right to eating an adult diet. And he was paying the price for it.

"Would you like mint or strawberry rinse today?" Pomfrey called into the bathroom as he spat the last chunks of food that caught in his gums on the way back out.

"Spearmint, if you'd be so kind." he grumbled back as he wiped his mouth clean with a piece of toilet paper.

He flushed the toilet, cleaning a few spots of vomit from the bowl with another loose piece of tissue, and walked over to the sink area. The muggle brand of mouthwash waited for him like a gift from heaven and he gargled the burning liquid with the appreciation of a drowning man finding land. He had to fight the urge to swallow and remove the taste of bile from his throat. That would not do his stomach any favors.

He walked, not stumbled, back to his bed and felt a smidgeon of pride slowly return at the small success.

He could have laughed at how pathetic and weak he was from three days of quasi-nutrition and the lack of energy that came with it. He couldn't begin to imagine how screwed he would have been if he had to get escape that chamber and sneak out of Hogwarts on his own. He would have starved to death after a few days on his own unless he were to break into some woman's house and steal baby food. Would he have resorted to that? He wasn't sure.

Regardless he would have gotten sick and died due to his lack of an immune system. That problem he did see fit to tell the medi-witch about. His bum was all the sorer for it. The cocktail of innoculations he received were decidedly unpleasant, but at least he wasn't going to keel over the first time somebody sneezed on him.

It was already night time and he had already slept the whole day away. Again. Realizing he wasn't going to get any more rest he returned to his newfound hobby of staring at the ceiling.

The clacking of hard heeled boots coming towards his bed was his first sign of trouble.

"Still moping, are we Tom?" he groaned at the sound of HER voice as he wrapped the bleached linen back around himself.

"Hello to you too, Minerva." said Tom to his former upperclassman.

He turned to look at the woman. God she'd gotten old. She went from being two years older than him to over fifty years older than him in the blink of an eye. From his perspective at least. She still had that same bitchy expression permanently affixed to her face. The pursed lips and haughty attitude were kind of hot when she had smooth skin, a figure slimmer than a toothpick and an impressive tan for a bookworm. As she was now, her skin pale and wrinkled with age, her demeanor was simply punchable.

She carried a large stack of books propped underneath her chin. Some things really don't change do they?

"I figured seventy six hours crying like a third year girl after a silly breakup was enough. You're done feeling sorry for yourself."

It was not a question. It was a demand. A statement of a change in reality she was willing into existence.

She dropped the stack of books onto his bed, and by extension him, sending them into a heap around his legs. He picked up the particularly large tome that landed between his legs and was surprised the thing didn't fall apart in his hands. It was ancient. It's edges were long since worn out and its once perfectly white pages yellowed through. He was almost as shocked to recognize the title of the transfiguration book. And the charms book. And defense books. And his other charms book from year four. And a transfiguration book from year one.

"You kept all of your old school books?" asked Tom incredulously, glowering at the woman as she brushed herself off.

"Of course!" she said with a shrug as if it were a silly question. She folded her arms defensively. "Didn't you?"

Riddle considered the woman for a moment before scrounging around the pile of textbooks. He picked up a fifth and sixth year charms book and opened them both to the glossary.

"You see here how in the first chapter of every edition it gives a summary and refresher on EVERY spell in the previous years edition?" He asked rhetorically handing one of the books to her.

"Well, yes, but..." she sputtered as she gingerly took the book from him.

"AND do you recall how every year Hogwarts gets a whole new batch of students, or returning students, in need of books? Some of whom can't afford their own?" continued Tom, interrupting her earlier retort.

"Yes but, I ... wait." She paused as she seemed to digest what he said. "Are you saying you gave your old books away to younger students?"

"Yup."

"You?"

"Me."

"Every year?"

"Every single one."

"That's very... charitable of you."

"Yes... What of it?"

Her glowering transformed into a deep scowl of skepticism. However did she come to have such deep wrinkles? He wondered.

"I'm sorry but I just can't picture you doing that Tom."

He could only blink at her.

"What?" he demanded more than asked.

"Well, you were always kind of stingy. I would have expected you to throw them away before donating them to anybody."

The last vestiges of his normally cool demeanor vanished, as it always did when they argued.

"I wasn't stingy you trust fund cocotte, I was bloody poor!"

She sputtered for a moment, trying to decide if she was bothered by his profanity or the insult. She resorted to old faithful.

"Fuck you!" she screamed.

"Fuck YOU!" he screamed back, putting emphasis on the subject of the statement.

She turned heel and stormed away. He couldn't even releasing the sigh of relief at her departure before she turned back on him, just shy of the hospital wing entrance. She had THAT look on her face. The look girls wear whenever they try to find a plot hole in a man's story. He tried practicing that expression in the bathroom mirror in his fifth year. Men must lack the facial muscles or bone structure.

"Wait just one minute. If you were so poor why would you give the books away instead of selling them secondhand or pawning them?"

Awww. How cute. She thought she caught him in a lie! She never learns.

"Because, Minerva." he said in his best imitation of her matter-of-fact voice. "I lacked the ability to pay back my upperclassman for giving them to me in the first place, so instead I paid it forward by giving my books away to newer students. Even I don't try to profit off of gifts from others." - Usually.

And there it was. Guilt. Plain as day on her face. People always thought he was a silver tongued liar(which he would never deny), but in most cases the truth(or a part of it) was a better weapon to stab at a person's heart or tool to convince them of your perspective.

"Oh. Well. Of course... Excuse me." she sputtered before turning to leave again.

"Minerva!" he called before she vanished from sight.

She whipped back around, no doubt expecting another bout of expletives.

"Thank you." he said in his most heartfelt, and well practiced, tone.

Her face softened for a fraction of a second before hardening again. He was sure if anybody else were watching they would have missed it.

"For the books, I mean." he clarified.

She glared.

"Not just these ones." he continued, indicating the pile on his lap. "The ones you gave me in my fourth year. If you'll recall that's how we first met."

Her brow furrowed as she examined him. He watched with amusement as recognition slowly dawned on her face and she dug up those memories that to him were relatively fresh.

Then she really did leave.

The silence that followed brought him a deep sense of nostalgia. It was the same silence that always followed their fights back in the day. For a moment it was as if he never left and he could almost delude himself into thinking he hadn't, and that the former head girl had simply suffered an accident with an aging potion.

"I missed our little chats." he mumbled to himself with a chuckle.

* * *

Minerva was right. He was tired of feeling sorry for himself. And tired in general.

Reviewing his old textbooks went a long way towards alleviating his boredom. During his stay there the only interesting thing to happen was when the mediwitch and potions master, who looked an awful lot like that surly Eileen girl in the year above Minerva, came in on the second day to unpetrify the victims of the basilisk.

He made a mental note to meet with the mute potions nerd and see how well she had aged compared to Minerva and considered which other students from his time at hogwarts would make an interesting case study in aging gracefully. He watched the Hogwarts staff begin the slow process of reviving his fellow guests with equal parts guilt and fascination.

He didn't envy Pomfrey's job. Trying to coax a tube down the throat of a person turned to stone was difficult enough, but they had to do it to four students and a CAT! Which was probably easier done petrified than if the feline were awake. Correction, it was definitely easier if Harry's memories of how unpleasant she was could be believed.

It was the ghost of Sir Nicholas De Mimsy that fascinated him. The charms professor, a part goblin called Flitwick, used a combination of several spells to aerosolize the mandrake draught without heating it (which probably would have ruined the potion) giving Nick a cold steam bath. Flitwick did it all wordlessly, much to Tom's chagrin, so he'd have to wait to ask the diminutive man about it some other time. The entire hospital wing stank something fierce for the rest of the day. When he asked her, Pomfrey said it would be a couple more days before everyone woke up.

He doubted something that interesting would happen again during his stay so he took to reviewing the old texts from his first year books through fourth. He wasn't allowed a wand to practice the material but he could walk down memory lane and try to remember his fellow students during his time in Hogwarts and compare his own experiences with Harry's. Thus he spent the whole evening properly parsing which memories were his and which were Harry's, with mixed success. He hadn't gotten very far in his self taught occlumency, but he learned enough to organize his memories into a mental castle and created a separate one for Harry's. It was slow work but as the day wore on he regained some sense of self.

The hospital wing was bathed in golden light from the rising sun when he decided to finish up for the night. That was when one of the the other patients decided now was a good time to scare him out of his skin with a sudden high pitched gasp.

The girl in the bed next to him sat bolt upright in an instant. He dropped the history book he was preparing to bookmark when she did.

The bushy haired girl had that squinting glare, the one that every decidedly-not-a-morning-person has when they wake up. The slow breath she released as she surveyed her surroundings sounded like a hiss and when roughly translated into parseltongue sounded like a groaned _'fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck'_. Which seemed appropriate.

He cowered behind his book as her gaze landed on him. Hoping the girl would go right back to sleep he dared to peek over the top. She was now standing at his bedside, staring down at him with eyes so tightly squinted that for a moment he wondered if she was sleep walking. That was until she broke out in a big, toothy grin.

Emphasis on toothy. She really should get those incisors filed down. Maybe Tom could 'borrow' one of those industrial grinders he'd used on his summer job down on the muggle docks? He knew a guy down by the docks from when he worked under the table. Who had probably long since died from old age. Hmm.

"Good to finally meetcha." she said, offering a hand, which he took while fighting to keep an expression of deep horror off of his face. "I'm Hermione Granger. You look so much like your cousin!"

He stared back at her, still shaking her hand. She'd been looking forward to meeting him? Did she know he was Voldemort? Who the hell looked forward to meeting such a disgusting creature? Had she mistaken his identity? Did she know who he really was but not that he'd one day become the dark lord? All of these thoughts and more would have been running through his head if the normally analytical voice in the front of his wasn't being overpowered by the panicking voice in the back of his head a voice that was now screaming _'Oh shit! Oh shit! Oh shit!'_ at a deafening decibel.

"Huh?" he said with utmost eloquence.

He moved his free hand to his ear as if he hadn't quite heard her.

"Hermione. Like from the Odyssey" she unhelpfully explained. "When Harry said you were bigger than him I expected you to be rounder, big boned if you will. Not taller and older. Does scrawniness run in both the Potter and Evans line alike?"

He continued to stare at her awkwardly as her questions got increasingly rude. With that last one Tom realized who this girl thought he was.

"I'm not Dudley!" he half yelled with incredulity. To her credit she didn't even flinch at his venom. Impressive. "That spoiled fatass wouldn't fit through the doors of the great hall!"

Her smile widened as she let go of his hand.

"Erm. And by that I mean 'Who is Dudley? Does he strike an imposing figure?'." he tried to backtrack.

She giggled, still showing off her massive teeth. He wondered if he should try extracting one of those to hit the diary with. Basilisk fangs be damned, those chompers looked like the bane of horcruxes and dark beasts alike.

"Okay. I'm stumped. Who are you really?"

Oh? Doth his ears deceive him? Had the young lady asked him to lie? His specialty! He recovered his composure and worked to make his face placid, if a little smug. Time for the oldest technique in the book.

Let them come up with your lie for you.

"Well you've only made one guess. You get two more, little lady." he said as he flashed her the most minute hint of a smile. This one he saved for younger girls who tried to act older than they were and who were very bad at hiding their crush on him.

Hermione just rolled her eyes and he tried to dig through Harry's memories of her as she spoke. Really he was just stalling her until he could come up with something believable.

"Let's see. You look like Harry." True enough. "Kind of talk like Harry, at least when he's not being all shy." He had no objective frame of reference for that claim, but he believed it . "You know his cousin. " Shit. "And you're what, sixteen?"

He waved his hand in a _'Meh. Kind of.'_ motion.

She rubbed her chin thoughtfully as she combined these disparate facts in her hunt for a conclusion. She also went back to squinting at him like a bug underneath a magnifying glass. Her scrutiny made him feel oddly naked and he pulled his sheets tighter over himself as a result.

"You are, in fact, Harry Potter!" She proclaimed as her grin returned. "You brewed another batch of polyjuice potion without me and tried to infiltrate Slytherin as an older student but you botched it!"

He stared at her.

She stared back.

He stared at her some more.

She started to look less sure of herself.

"Wow." said Tom.

It's all he could come up with.

"Yeeeaaaaahhhhhh." she said nervously.

"That is one hell of a guess!" he said. "I take it you have some experience with polyjuice potions going wrong?"

By now he'd already retrieved the more recent memories of the little girl from the the back of his mind where he disposed of most of his new, ill gotten, knowledge. He already knew the answer.

"Yeah... a bit. I take it that's a no?" she said, deflating before his eyes.

"Decidedly so. Try again for a sickle?" He offered with a sly grin.

She scrunched up her face and re-adopted that inquisitive glare of hers. She stayed like that for five whole minutes. He counted. If he had that kind of concentration he could have passed all of his newts as a fourth year.

"I give up. Who are you?" She conceded rather quickly.

He shook his head.

"Would you believe me if I said I'm a long lost cousin on his father's side?"

"Not a chance."

'"I'm his dad, but I've been frozen in an iceberg for ten years and decided to get some nip and tuck before coming to see him?"

"No."

"Shade of a sixteen year old Voldemort brought back to life through horrifically dark magic?" This one he said with a ghostly 'wooooo' tone.

"Come on! How gullible do I look?"

"I'm Harry's time traveling grandson from the future who came back in time because I'm in love with you? Nana."

"Gross! No!"

Whether she was disgusted at the idea that she had married and had children with Harry or that a grandchild born from their union would come back in time to woo her, he couldn't tell. Probably the idea of being with a boy full stop, he decided.

Tom shrugged with a fake sigh.

"Well. I don't know what to tell you, kiddo. The truth is I'm not allowed to share my identity with you. Headmaster's orders." he explained, hoping he could contact Dumbledore and ask him to cover up for his lie before the girl went asking him.

She huffed and puffed her cheeks, now red with frustration. He could not BELIEVE Harry had such a hard time dealing with her tantrums. This girl was easier to pick on than Myrtle Warren!

"Well I think you're a right big jerk. If you don't tell me who you are I'll - "

What she intended to do if he continued to keep his secret the world will never know, because he decided not to let her finish that threat.

"Madam Pomfrey! The vegetables are getting uppity!" he yelled out and the school nurse came running.

"Miss Granger! Get back in bed this minute!" roared Pomfrey as she stormed through the aisles of hospital beds.

Hermione cowered as the rampaging witch approached, barely managing to fling the sheets back over herself before the terror was upon her. Madam Pomfrey sniffed at the recently revived girl and yanked the covers off of her.

"On second thought, get over to the showers. You've been petrified for twenty three whole days and you desperately need one. Your hair looks horrendous!" Pomfrey ordered.

Tom resisted the urge to inform Pomfrey that Hermione's hair always looked horrendous. Partly because he shouldn't know that information and the bushy haired girl was smart enough to recognize that he shouldn't know that information, but also because her hair did look even messier than normal, almost like she'd been electrocuted. Apparently petrification does not turn a victim's hair to stone.

"I'll send for a change of clothes and a proper meal for you. You focus on getting yourself cleaned up." Pomfrey added as she chased the cowering child to the shower room.

All she was missing was a cattle prod, Tom thought to himself as he rolled over and buried his face into the pillow.

He slept like a baby that day.

* * *

 ** _Azkaban Prison:_**

Sirius Black tossed the flimsy pillow across his cell, giving up on any chance of tuning out the raucous echoing throughout the prison. It landed with an unheard thud against the stone wall as the prison shook again.

When typhoons passed over the island of Azkaban half of the cells in the prison find themselves submerged beneath the rising tide. His was one of those cells. The only reason he wasn't drowning at the moment was due to the water repelling enchantments on the bars of his window. It gave the impression of being trapped in an air bubble beneath the sea.

Naturally the magic didn't keep all of the water out as the interior of his cell was completely soaked, its occupant very much included.

When another flash of lightning illuminated his cell he retrieved the soggy sack of feathers and wrung it out. He couldn't even hear the water falling to the stone floor over the howling of the wind, roaring of thunder and yelling of other prisoners. He shifted back into padfoot and carrying it back to the bed with his jaws.

No matter how long one remained trapped in Azkaban the terror of these storms never left them. The wind howling through the prisons halls sounded so very much like the hollow breathing of the prison guards. Dementors are terrible enough company when the sun shown, but are so much worse when the prison submerged.

Did you know dementors can swim? Because before his arrest Sirius was blissfully unaware of that fact. He made the mistake of looking through the bars during one of these storms. Once. And that was one time too many. The sight of the ghostly, cloaked figures submerged and illuminated by brief flashes was like a glimpse into hell itself. They were like the spirits of drowning victims turned inferi and encircling their helpless prey.

They occasionally cast a shadow into prisoner cells with the flashes of nature's wrath, adding to the nightmare.

The dementors were especially riled up as of late. Their slow feeding on the prisoners had erupted into a veritable feast three days ago. That's when the screaming began.

From every level, in every hallway, prisoners hooted and hollered in joy and excitement.(And no small amount of madness) The guards haven't figured out why, and they probably don't care. All They knew is that their herd of cattle were suddenly producing happy memories faster than they could consume them. The usual luxuries of cigarettes and narcotics given to prisoners to increase yields were long forgotten in piles between cells.

The other prisoners had continued to yell and bang on the cages ever since and for the life of him Sirius couldn't figure out why. Like the dementors though, he didn't care. He just wanted to sleep. Sleep and escape the suffering of those memories. But as a dog his hearing was more sensitive and the noise was deafening. As a man the nightmares were too much to bear.

"NO!" the man in the cell adjacent to his screamed. Again.

"He can't be back. He can't! I destroyed it!"

Sirius' patience finally ran out. The man had ranted and raved and screamed nonstop since the rest of the screaming began. Unlike theirs, his shrieks held no joy. Only rage and despair. The usual for prisoners of Azkaban. He thrashed around his cell and in the light of day could be seen to be covered in blood from where his shackles cut into his wrist and ankles as he desperately tried to break out. His wounds had no doubt gotten worse since daylight last pierced their windows.

He was kind of pathetic. But that's what Sirius had come to expect from the man. Pathetic things.

"Aaaaaah!" the man screeched sending Sirius' ears ringing.

He transformed back into the form of man, taking great care in placing his paws into the shackles before doing so to make sure they clasped his wrist when he finished, and approached the bars of his own cell.

"What is it?" Sirius asked/yelled across the hallway. "Who's back? What is it that you destroyed?"

It was a long shot, trying to get a coherent answer out of a man driven insane by this hellish place. The only reason Sirius wasn't equally bad off was the rage brought about by the knowledge of his innocence keeping him warm at night. To say nothing of his contentedness with being there. He deserved this. As did the man across the hallway.

To Sirius' surprise the man became lucid before his very eyes and came running to his cell bars to look at him. Another flash of lightning lit the prison and they stared at each-others equally decrepit forms. That's when Sirius saw it. That's when the pieces fell into place. The dark mark, red and inflamed, shone on his neighbors' glistening wrist. Sirius prayed that he was mistaken. That it was a trick of the light. But he knew it to be true.

"His horcrux!" Regulus Arcturus Black told his brother. "I destroyed his fucking horcrux!"


	3. 3: Inter-House Cooperation

**Chapter 3:**

 **Inter-House Cooperation**

* * *

Ronald Weasley sat alone in the Gryffindor common room that night.

The fire was little more than embers at this point but he couldn't bring himself to break eye contact with the dying lightsource. It had been a whole day since Dumbledore summoned him, Fred, George and Percy to his office where their parents sat waiting for them. They expected the headmaster to explain the condition of Harry and their sister, who they at that point assumed had been ushered to the now barricaded hospital wing. They had not expected to spend the rest of that day helplessly watching their mother cry.

Ron still couldn't manage a tear of his own. He tried to force it, as if it was his duty to show some outward sign of his inner suffering, but he just didn't have it in him. Maybe it was that whole 'denial' step of dealing with death that people believe in. Maybe he'd already counted her as dead after the blood on the wall said as much, or maybe he'd come to accept it in his days of waiting. Harry's death, on the other hand, hit him hard.

His best friend was invincible. Full stop. He couldn't have died. Ron was proof positive that the boy-who-lived could swan dive into the mouth of an active volcano with a barrel of exploding ginger eyelashes strapped to his back and he'd crawl out of the crater with nothing to show for it but singed robes. What hope did some legless lizard, no matter how magical, have against the force of nature that was Harry Potter? Ron could more easily stop a hurricane by spitting at it.

It was ridiculous. It was asinine. The fact that Dumbledore thought so low of Ron's intelligence that he thought he'd believe such a lie was insulting!

He almost jumped when Fred and George crashed into the cushions on either side of him with identical sighs, very rudely breaking him from his thoughts. They sank into a deep slouch as they joined him in gazing at the embers. They sat in silence for some time, undoubtedly looking the pinnacle of despondency to an outside observer.

"So. You guys aren't going to try and cheer me up?" he asked his brothers when the silence dragged on too long.

Fred grunted. George chuckled.

"Even we can recognize a lost cause when we see one." said Fred.

"We just wanted to see if your coping method was better than ours." said George. "I gotta tell ya, this isn't doing it for me."

Ron grimaced and grabbed the bucket of sand from the edge of the hearth. He threw it, pale and all, into the firebox, extinguishing what was left of the once roaring flames. With that chore done he stood up and stretched the kinks out of his back, looking from Fred to George.

"And what was your coping method?"

The two proceeded to have a full length aristotelian debate with nothing more than eyebrow movements, hand waving and shrugs. Fred launched the discussion with a toothy wince and raised shoulder. George countered with a thumb to Ron and a wave of his hand in a _'Get it over with'_ motion. Fred responded with a two handed movement indicating himself and George and then waving one hand over his head indicating the ceiling or castle at large. Eventually Fred relented to a particularly persuasive eyebrow wiggle and nod towards Ron from George and produced a square piece of parchment before unfolding it.

It was blank, marked with more wrinkles than a retired scarlet woman and bore stains of what he hoped was coffee. Ron took it, struggling to hold the wall-chart sized piece of paper. The thing was nearly as big as he was. He turned it over, examined the back, turned it over again to examine the front and turned his gaze to his brothers with a suspicion filled glare. They answered his unspoken question by simultaneously tapping the parchment with their wands and speaking in stereo.

"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."

Lines of ink spread across the surface of the paper like impossibly thin roots of a plant. They grew over each other in checkered patterns, merged into larger lines and framed the edges and corners of the parchment with swirling patterns. Green letters, written in impressively beautiful calligraphy, grew from the black ink and proclaimed:

 _Messrs. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs_

 _Purveyors of Aids to Magical Mischief-Makers_

 _are proud to present_

THE MARAUDER'S MAP

"We've been looking for the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets." explained Fred as Ron examined the details of the table-sized parchment.

He found the Gryffindor common room with ease where he spotted three dots indicating the three Weasleys. Their names hovered over the dots exclaiming who they were. The dormitories were not shown, which made sense considering it was seven rooms spread over seven identical floors magically occupying the same ten meter by ten meter space. However the entrance to the common room showed a list of everybody occupying them in random order.

Names of young students like _'Longbottom, Neville'_ sat beside names of older students he knew like _'Woods, Oliver'_ and older students he didn't know like _'Pettigrew, Peter'._ He felt guilty at the epiphany of realizing he didn't know the names of any of his upperclassmen that weren't related to him or on the quidditch team. He considered vowing to remedy that issue, but discarded the vow almost immediately. He'd never actually go through with it. Too much work. The girls dormitory was also hidden and near the entrance thirty three names were listed compared to the thirty for the boys dormitory. Both were shy of the normal thirty five and Ron counted three of the missing boys currently loitering next to the fireplace. He stared in confusion as he tried to figure out who else was missing before remembering Percy went on prefect patrol an hour earlier and noticing that the name _'Potter, Harry'_ was missing from the list.

"And hoping in vain to find Harry or Ginny sneaking somewhere around the castle grounds." added George after the few minutes of silence.

Ron nodded and searched the entirety of the map for the hospital wing when his heart leapt.

"Hermione and the others are moving!" he said, placing the map on the floor so Fred and George could see it for themselves.

Sure enough, Hermione was up and about in the hospital wing. She wasn't the only one. Justin, Colin and Penelope were all with her huddling near the center of the ward along with a fourth person.

"Whoa. The map's never done that before." commented Fred.

The name for this mysterious fifth person was illegible, not due to any smudging or poor penmanship, but because it kept changing. Before Ron's very eyes it went from _'Gar Marmelo Rester_ ' to ' _Hamra Momel Pisley_ ' to ' _Tarevry Joelo Weattle_ '. Madame Pomfrey was notably missing from the hospital wing but Nicholas De Mimsy-Porpington was just outside of it in the hallway.

"A mystery for later I suppose." George said in defeat.

Then something else happened. The dot labeled ' _Finch-Fletchley, Justin_ ' seemingly flew across the room towards the entrance of the ward, stopping just shy of the hallway beyond. The dot labeled _'Clearwater, Penelope'_ followed suit as Justin walked back around to join the other dots on the map.

It wasn't uncommon for objects to mysteriously fly across rooms, but Peeves was several floors down and on the other side of the castle if the map was to be believed.

Then Hermione followed Penelope's example.

"What are they doing?"

* * *

The bushy haired girl roared with laughter as she slid across the magically slicked floor, taking care to keep her arms wrapped around her knees and keep skirt in place. The girl clearly learned a lesson from Penelope failing to keep purdence in mind when she made the dive.

"Congrats guys." said Penelope as Hermione brushed herself off. "You've mastered the glisseo charm!"

Tom nodded in encouragement as he kneeled down and rubbed the slick floor.

"Not a single bump or rough spot to be found. Couldn't have done it better myself." he lied.

Colin, a miniscule boy with mousy hair, beamed at him as he stood up.

"You wizards sure do suffer from a lack of water slides in your world." he said with a toothy, though not quite Granger-toothy, grin.

Both Justin and Hermione laughed but seemed to agree. Tom had never heard of a water slide but he could guess what it was.

"Well I hate to break it to you, Creevey, but you're a wizard too. But I'd say this is a decent replacement, am I right?" Said justin.

The other three nodded and Tom, deciding to act like he knew what they were talking about, nodded as well.

"Next summer let's go ahead and try to transfigure one of those giant water slides next to the lake. Like the ones Americans have." said Penelope, who Tom was fast starting to like.

"Oooh. That would be great! Maybe we can pool our money to buy one of those floating bouncy castle blocks for the lake too!" said Hermione, who he was fast starting to dislike.

What in the blazes was a floating bouncy castle block?

"Oh! I visited my cousin in the states once and we went to a waterpark with one of those." Justin explained. "I think they just call them inflatable blobs. You jump onto it on one end from a platform and it flings whoever's on the other end into the air. So much fun."

Tom tried to ignore his developing headache and keep a friendly exterior, but he was failing.

"You guys! We didn't teach you this spell just for fun. It could really save your life!" Tom half-chastised.

"it's true." said Penelope. "They really should start teaching it to first years. Imagine if you'd known this spell when you fought off that troll last year, eh Hermione?"

Troll? Hermione had fought a troll? Tom didn't recall that. You'd think that would stand out in the jumbled mess that was his mind. But a glisseo charm definitely would have made short work of a troll. They have neither good balance nor good observational skills.

"Yeah. It's ridiculous." Justin added. "You never start a sorcerer in D and D without the grease spell. This should be taught in the first lesson."

This comment got him strange, almost disgusted looks from his fellow muggleborns. Tom decided not to ask what 'D and D' stood for.

"By the time they teach it to fifth years you get nothing but immature laughter." Penelope went on. "By then they can all only come up with naughty uses for it."

"Really?" said Colin. "Because I'm coming up with plenty of naughty uses for it myself."

Penelope did a poor job of hiding her shock at hearing those words from an eleven year old boy. Tom hoped he had a better poker face. He made a mental note to visit the boy's home unannounced at the first opportunity. Something untoward must be going on there and he'd have to put a stop to it, just like he'd done with Dennis and Amy's mother in that cave.

"I'll have to show this to the Weasley twins." Colin added before mumbling to himself about a scheme involving somebody named Snape, a cauldron of chicken grease and a sack of itching powder.

Ah, innocence. Tom scratched off _'Subjecting Mister and Misses Creevey to a fate worse than death'_ off of his mental to-do list. It was for the best. He doubted he could outdo his work on Amelia Benson nee Bishop.

"Children!" They all whipped around to see nearly-headless Nick's flopping head peering through the floor. "Madam Pomfrey is coming. Back into your beds. Hurry!"

They thanked their partner in crime and all rushed back to their own beds, flinging the sheets over themselves. His fellow inmates were a little too enthusiastic in their attempts to mimic deep and even breathing. They were terrible at pretending to be asleep.

Madam Pomfrey strolled into the hospital wing moments later. She carried a pile of clean linen high enough to hide her head. She lightly placed the top section of the stack on the railing at the foot of Creevey's bed, doing her best not to wake him up, and walked across to where Penelope 'slept'. A split second later the mediwitch landed on her back with a sickening thud as the sheets and blankets she carried flew in every direction as if scattered by a gust of wind.

Everyone made a show of waking up at the noise, a much more impressive display of acting skill than their fake sleep, and Tom spied Hermione surreptitiously cast the counter for the glisseo spell from the bed beside him. He couldn't hear her incantation but he did pick up the very grown up swearing she whispered under her breath at how stupid it was to leave the spell active.

"Madam are you okay?" a tall, red haired boy - Percy, Tom recalled - said in concern as he ran in and tried to help her to her feet.

Pomfrey refused his hand, opting to rise on her own. Her movements were delicate and slow. Tom noted the hand she used to check her waist as she stood and realized broken hips were probably a sensible concern for a woman her age. Not that she looked particularly old. Not at all.

"Madam, you are overworked." said Sir Nicholas as he floated up to her. "Perhaps you should hand over your duties to Mister Weasley a bit early and call it an evening?"

Percy, to his credit, didn't comment on the ghost's suggestion but did do his usual display of pride by standing at attention. Tom spotted the red tinge to his ears, and so did his girlfriend if her knowing smile was any indication. Pomfrey didn't say anything. Staring off into space. After a moment she waved for Percy to take over and left the hospital wing with a knight as her escort. She deserved it.

They all said goodbye to Pomfrey and Sir Nicholas and with them their chance at an evening of fun.

With the return of 'adult' supervision they all got back into their beds and this time genuinely tried to go back to sleep instead of pretending. This proved difficult for Tom. The excitement of glisseo sliding with his new not-quite-friends would take a while to wear off and Tom usually had enough difficulty winding down on excitement-free evenings. He considered the idea of summoning a house elf to bring him some hot apple cider(which never failed to put him right to sleep) but discarded the idea. For one thing, he didn't know the names of any current house-elves in Hogwarts and for another he didn't want the youngsters around him to discover that they could lazily summon house elve's any time they wished. It wasn't good for your work ethic. It was dreadful for your waistline.

He was on the cusp of blissful sleep when a thundering crash echoed from the hallway outside of the hospital wing. Tom sat bolt upright in his bed just in time to see Percy drop the book he was reading and sprint out of the room to investigate. That guy sure could move when he felt like it.

Silence rang after the door slammed shut behind the prefect. Looking at the other prisoners told Tom that he was the only person having difficulty falling asleep.

"Wha was that?" Colin grumbled at a whisper.

Before they could wager a guess the lavatory door opened and out stepped their answer.

"Fred!" Hermione asked/accused.

He shushed her before sneaking across to the door his older brother had just slammed shut. He cracked it open and peering outside.

"It's George, actually." he said, still whispering as he gently closed the door, holding the handle down for extra guile. "Now come on, you're all going to want to be a part of this."

He walked back over to the lavatory and removed a shoe which he used to prop it open. He hobbled his way over to Hermione's bed and conjured a Granger sized pillow. He unceremoniously shoved the girl out of the bed and tucked the pillow in like his own child. Her replacement was convincing enough.

Hermione tried to object but George shoved her along towards the lavatory. The rest of them didn't bother trying to resist, and to be fair Tom was sure none of them would choose an evening in the hospital wing over an adventure with the living bludgers anyways. Penelope even helped to conjure pillows for stuffing the sheets before joining them at the door.

"I'm staying." she said as George slipped his shoe back on. "But you guys have fun.

"Trust me Penny." said George. "You don't want to miss out on this."

She looked at him smugly. "As if I'd rather miss out on the chance to spend a few hours alone with my boyfriend in a room full of comfy beds? Not likely. Now get going before I decide to act like a proper prefect." She turned on Tom, pointing what she must have thought was an authoritative finger at him. "You be sure to give me all of the details later. Alright?"

"You got it." said Tom. "I suppose we couldn't have picked a better person for distraction duty. Later."

With that the sole Ravenclaw of their group closed the door behind them and they were down to one Slytherin, one Hufflepuff and three Gryffindors. Tom wasn't liking the demographic shift.

"All right come on. Quickly!" whispered George as he lead them down the rows of toilets and shower stalls.

He stopped near the very back of the tiled room and wiggled his way into a gap between two showers. Tom heard the telltale tapping of a wand against stone before the redhead whispered the password to what would no doubt become Tom's favorite secret passage in the coming days.

"They cured my scrivener's palsy. I need to go catch it again."

George squeezed back out as the grinding sound of the opening passage echoed throughout the room.

"All right. Mystery man. You first." sais George, motioning for Tom to squeeze into the dark cavity.

Tom looked over both of his shoulders as if expecting to find a previously unseen man standing behind him. Apparently George was referring to him.

"We need somebody at the bottom to catch these midgets if they slip and fall." said George, indicating their smaller companions with a thumb. "You're the biggest person here."

Tom shrugged in agreement at this reasoning and pushed through. The secret passage was barely more than a manhole with what looked like a fire escape ladder. George's concerns were valid. The bars were as slick as you'd expect a fire escape ladder beside a communal shower room to be. He almost slipped and fell no less than four times himself.

The ladder was three whole stories high and spat him out into a first floor corridor, the one opposite the first floor of the hospital tower. He was greeted by George's other half and the last person he wanted to see.

"Who're you?" Ron asked. Rather rudely too.

Tom shook his head. "Can't say. Headmasters orders."

He called up the ladder to say he was finished and to be careful. Hermione came next and upon reaching the bottom she immediately embraced Ron in what he could tell was a bone crushing hug. The only kind of hug she ever gave. Not that Tom had ever personally experienced one.

"It's so good to see you Ron! It's dreadful that they aren't allowing visitors." Hermione said as she broke the embrace.

"S'fine. Who's your new friend?" he asked, pointing at Tom.

"Can't say. Headmasters orders." she repeated, turning away from her friend to slyly wink at Tom.

And like that his fondness for the beaver started to grow back.

Colin almost made it all the way down but slipped at the last eight foot stretch of ladder, falling safely into Tom and Fred's waiting arms. Justin and George joined them soon after. Each was greeted by a duet of hugs and when they all arrived his six companions wore nothing but smiles.

"That's everyone. Penny decided to stay back and 'distract' Perc." said George.

"Right then. You want to tell them or should we?" said Fred, clasping Ron on the shoulder.

The youngest Weasley glanced between his two brothers pleadingly. They gave him no quarter and he audibly swallowed before sticking his chin up and practically glowing with Gryffindor courage.

"Dumbledore says Harry and Ginny are dead."

Hermione, Colin and Justin all visibly paled as their smiles melted away. Tom noticed George strategically positioning himself to catch them if the news turned out to be too much to grasp. Tom mirrored the sentiment and stood behind Justin, who was the first to recover.

"You snuck us out of the hospital wing to tell us THAT!" he said venomously. "No wonder they won't let you guys visit. I really didn't need to hear that while my joints are still part stone."

Tom flinched at the idea of how painful walking must be for them all. This entire ordeal was fast becoming nothing more than a guilt-fest for him. Leave it to Hermione to improve the mood.

"You don't believe him." Hermione said in an impressively serious voice.

Ron locked eyes with her and nodded, just as seriously.

"The old man refused to answer any of our questions." said Fred.

"Everything we know, we learned from Ron." said George.

They all turned their attention back to the smallest ball of freckles, who gulped again.

"The heir of Slytherin kidnapped Ginny. Harry and I tracked down the entrance to the chamber and went after her." Ron explained, speaking at speeds that outstripped Hermione's usual breathless tirades. "We also kidnapped Professor Lockhart, who turned out to be a fraud and almost got us killed when he tried to obliviate us and causing a cave in. We all survived but Harry and I were separated, he went on and I went back to get help. That's all I know."

They all took a moment to digest that.

"Let me guess." said Tom, breaking the silence. "You're going to do what all students do when the adults refuse to give us answers. You want to go find out the truth for yourself?"

Fred and George both beamed at him. Sometimes it really was that easy to earn somebody's friendship.

"Exactly." said Ron.

"And we figured." started Fred.

"If we're going to enter a basilisk's lair." continued George.

"We ought to bring along the champs who beat it in a staring contest." finished Ron, grinning widely at the success at completing the twin's line of thought.

Justin barked out a laugh, but it held no humor.

"I wouldn't say we came out on top in those contests." he complained.

Ah. Right. Hufflepuff. Cowards. The lot of them.

"And I don't fancy a rematch." added the youngest Gryffindor, timidly.

For shame.

"It's not about revenge." chastised Hermione, turning her hissing voice between Colin and Justin. "It's about doing the right thing and helping our friends!"

The girl was either secretly a master manipulator or had the uncanny ability to luck her way into saying the right thing. Both of the boys stood up straighter, Colin at the mention of doing the right thing and Justin at the word friend.

"So what's the plan?" asked Tom.

"Simple." answered Fred.

"We're kicking down the door to the Chamber of Secrets and turning the place upside down until we find our answers." explained George.


	4. 4: Scene of the Crime - Part 1

**Chapter 4:**

 **Scene of the Crime -** **Part 1**

* * *

"When you said we were going into the chamber of secrets, I assumed you actually knew how to enter it."

Tom glowered at Hermione before she even finished the condescending observation. The Weasley trio lead them all the way to the second floor bathroom, thankfully ghost free at the moment. Along the way they made three wrong turns, barely avoided a conflict with Peeves and snatched Colin out of the air just before he fell into the trick step near the astronomy tower corridor.

Ron then proceeded to paint the familiar sink with saliva for nearly five minutes as he tried his hand at parseltongue.

"Don't listen to her Ron. We have faith in you." Colin assured him.

The others had been incredibly patient with his attempts at opening the chamber. He felt foolish just watching the boy and Tom knew he would be embarrassed enough without being told off. Everyone save for Hermione did their best to keep him motivated.

"Maybe you should try inhaling as you hiss." suggested Justin.

"No, that's ridiculous!" spat Hermione. "Snakes hiss by forcibly expelling air from their glottis."

"Their what!?" said Tom, before the others could express the same sentiment.

"Their glottis." she explained. "The opening behind their tongues that they use to breathe. Don't you ever read?"

And thus it came to pass that the air of Slytherin received a lesson in snake anatomy from a Gryffindor mudblood. This day was just full of surprises.

"Maybe that's the secret." Colin suggested. "Maybe you need to use your tongue more."

Tom shared a knowing look with Fred and George at the unintentional innuendo before Justin went on.

"It's called parsel-' _tongue_ ' after all."

Ron took this suggestion in stride and came surprisingly close to saying ' _open_ ' in snake speak. Tom didn't bother hiding his surprise and allowed his eyebrows to reach his hairline.

Fred and George, clearly unable to recognize the improvement, ushered the others to a counter on the opposite side of the bathroom. They produce a large square of parchment they unfolded to reveal a map with a large, ornate title at the top center declaring it 'The Marauder's Map' with the names of its four creators below it. It wasn't immediately clear what the map was of and so Tom let his eyes drift to where he noticed some dots moving along the parchment.

"Clutter is no good for planning."

Tom looked up to see Fred had pointed his wand at the map as he said the phrase and when Tom looked back at it all of the moving dots and labels were gone.

"This is the Marauder's map." explained George. "It shows all of Hogwarts and its inhabitants. As well as most of the secret passages."

Fred directed their attention to a room on the second floor.

"It doesn't show any on the second floor bathroom, so clearly the Marauder's didn't know about this one."

He touched the map where Ron and the non-compliant sink would have been. It was a rather impressive map.

"You said it showed the inhabitants of Hogwarts too, but we're not showing up." Justin pointed out.

"Well that's what the password about clutter was all about." Fred explained. "It hides all of the names and room labels."

George gave Tom a not so sly wink.

Shit. They knew his name. At least they're keeping it secret from the youngins. He'd have to add that to the growing list of things to pass on to Dumbledore. HE really needed the old man to cover up for him now.

"Okay. But why are you showing this to us?" Colin asked.

The twins shrugged in unison.

"Figured we'd find it more interesting than watching your brother do his best cat impression?" said Tom.

"HEY!" came the easily predicted indignation from the sink.

"You focus on opening the passage Ronniekins!" Fred yelled back. "We'll handle the entertainment."

Fred and George went on to explain some of the places the map didn't show, like the common rooms of each house and the bottom of the lake. Tom asked if the room of requirement showed up and received a series of blank stares.

"I'll show you guys where that one is after we're done here." Tom offered. "It's damned cool."

Before the others could ask for details about the room Hermione made an offhand inquiry of her own.

"Can't we teach the map new secrets?"

As soon as the words left her mouth the map faded to white. Even the normal yellowing of age vanished, making room for a new message to appear.

 _You've found a new secret passage?_

As the large green letters faded in turn a series of four beautifully inked drawings appeared on each corner of the parchment. Each moved in a loop similar to a wizarding photo.

The first was a sleeping rat whose chest heaved with each 'zeta' that floated from its agape mouth.

The second was a dog scratching its' ear. The dark flecks coming off of him with each scratch could only be flees.

The third was a noble stag standing at attention, not moving at all.

The fourth was simply a moon with clouds passing over it.

More lettering appeared, with a line indicating that it was the stag speaking.

 _"Touch the map with your wand at the location of the new secret passage and say "Mischief discovered."_

The images faded and the map reappeared.

George followed the instructions. Upon tapping the second floor bathroom and uttering the incantation the rest of the map faded again as the depiction for the bathroom enlarged to fill most of the parchment.

The four images reappeared on the corners, but this time they were much more attentive. The rat, Wormtail, stood on its hind legs wringing its hands like a miserly merchant. The dog, Padfoot, sat at attention with its tongue lulling and the stag, who they could deduce was Prongs by process of elimination, was now laying down like a relaxed lion. Moony showed no changes, but honestly how would you go about making a moon expressive?

More instructions appeared near Prongs.

 _Tap the EXACT location of the passage entrance and utter the phrase 'Here be magical mischief makers in need of aid.'_

Fred did so and three long horizontal lines appeared near the broken sink stall on the map.

 _Leads to:_

 _Instructions:_

 _Misc:_

Despite being self-explanatory Prongs saw fit to give instructions on what to do.

 _Do NOT write on the map. Tap the line in question and speak, I will take dictation. In the first line state the name of the room the secret passage leads to._

 _In the second give step by step instructions on opening it, be certain to say which step number it is before giving instructions. Say the word 'one' for the first step, two for the second and so forth._

 _In Misc: warn about any dangers beyond the passage, any unique requirements such as time of day, special details about the entrance to help people find it or instructions on opening the passage from the other side if different from above._

If Tom wasn't impressed with the map before he certainly was now. The twins didn't waste any time.

"The Chamber of Secrets." said George, touching the first line with his wand.

"One. Say the word 'open' in parseltongue.' said Fred, tapping the next line.

"Must be able to speak parseltongue." said Hermione, tapping the third line. "Beware of basilisks."

The Weasley twins nodded in approval as she finished.

Their words appeared on the lines in black ink as they said them. The lines faded, along with the instructions and a new line of green text appeared below their instructions.

 _Is that all?_

"Should we add anything else?" Fred asked George.

"There's a snake engraved on the faucet." Ron yelled back.

They added that. Along with the detail that the sink doesn't work to help the particularly mentally impaired find it. Just in case.

Ss the map returned to normal, their changes finalized, Ron seemed to lose his patience.

"Open! Damn you!"

Tom figured that would be the end of their little excursion for the evening and got up, expecting the others to follow him back to the hospital wing. Imagine his shock when he turned around to see the sink obeying Ron's order and fall into the floor amidst uproarious applause from the others.

Ronald Weasley just LEARNED to speak parseltongue. That was supposed to be impossible. Many parseltongues in history have tried to teach it and only ever succeeded in teaching people to understand it. Not speak it. He wasn't sure which revelation was more surprising to him. That Ron had done the impossible, or that he'd mistaken parseltongue for english for the first time in years.

While he was lost in his thoughts the others advanced on Ron.

"Our wittle wonniekin is a parseltongue!" Fred cheered, rustling Ron's hair and ignoring his younger brothers' objections.

"We better watch out. The world isn't ready for a dark lord of the Weasley line." George added.

Tom could only stare as the others awarded Ron a well deserved series of punches to the arm in congratulations.

"But how?" Hermione finally broached.

That put a quick end to the fanfare. The others took up Tom's strategy of staring at one another in silence.

"Maybe the Weasley's actually are descended from Slytherin and just didn't know it?" Colin suggested.

"We are pureblood." Fred said, nodding.

"We don't advertise it but we are. And all pureblood families have mixed somewhere along the line." George added, nodding in turn.

"So maybe it's a recessive gene that just rarely expresses itself?" Hermione rationalised.

Tom shook his head. "But even if that's true there would be so many more parseltongues crawling out of the woodwork."

Hermione shrugged in response. "Not really. How often do people encounter snakes here in the northern isle?"

"Not often since Saint Patrick got rid of them all."

The ear to ear grin Justin showed off as he made the joke went a long way to lightening the mood. That didn't stop Ron from trying to drag it back down.

"But Harry could understand and speak to snakes without any training at all" said the smallest redhead. "Hell, he couldn't even tell it apart from english?"

"And some people are a natural on the broom while others have to practice." Hermione said with crossed arms. It was her 'I win' pose. " So yeah, there probably are tons more parseltongues around, they just never figure it out."

"If that's true then how many more metamorphmagus are out there and don't know it? Or celerimagi?"

"Celery mage eye?" Colin asked. The boy sure knew his phonics.

"Wizards who can move real fast." Tom explained with a dismissive wave. "It's actually much more impressive than it sounds."

"This is all really fascinating but don't we have a job to do?" Ron promoted.

They all turned to stare at the gaping hole Ron had opened up. It slowly dawned on them that their entire conversation of to that point was them stalling the inevitable plunge.

Tom caught George looking at him expectantly and decided to sever that idea at the bud.

"Oh no! No no no! I am NOT going first." He refused. "I don't even have a wand!"

"Doesn't matter." Fred countered. "Against a basilisk we might as well all be going in wandless."

"Yeah, and you're the new guy." said Justin. "We gotta see what you're made of. It's hazing time, newby!"

Thankfully Ron came to his rescue before his peers could

"You guys it's fine. I'll go."

And before anybody could object he leaped into the entrance and vanished into the great pipe. The others went silent again as they stared at the spot where he vanished.

Tom knew they wouldn't get a move on without some incentive. With a shrug he bent down and hooked each arm around his smallest companions chests. With his right he lifted Colin with ease. Hermione was a bit heavier than he expected, but neither managed to squirm out of his grasp before he made the leap into the gaping hole as well, dragging them with him.


	5. 5: Scene of the Crime - Part 2

**Chapter 5:**

 **Scene of the Crime -** **Part 2**

* * *

 **Canterbury England, 1938** :

Tom Riddle sat on a salt-eroded bench tossing pebbles over the cliff's edge. Watching them plummet into the raging ocean below served as a calming exercise for him.

Their yearly field trip to Canterbury had finally lost all lustre after five years of repeatedly exploring the same cathedrals, museums and overpriced shops that none of his foster siblings could hope to afford sweets from, let alone Tom himself. Even the enthusiasm of the newly minted six year olds going on their first ever outing couldn't break Tom out of his malaise.

That being said, he had yet to tire of the majesty of nature on display here at the white cliffs. They always spent their final day of the _Anonymous Donor_ funded trip walking the trail overlooking an endless blue horizon. This year the wind was calm and, finally being eleven years old, he was granted the privilege to walk unsupervised.

Unfortunately, the cost of this privilege was fast becoming too steep.

"I'm cold. Can we go back now?"

Tom turned to look at Amy and Dennis. Both were mere months younger than him, but due to happenstance of birth date he was the one tasked with babysitting them.

"It's August and the breeze is lovely, HOW can you be cold!?" Amy retorted on Tom's behalf, earning her a rare, and genuine, smile of gratitude from the older boy.

Indeed it was. After a two hour hike along the grassy trail he had worked up a sweat, and the breeze was doing wonders to cool him off. Dennis didn't need a rest break. He clearly had energy to spare and his excuse of being cold was an obvious attempt at goading Tom into continuing their jaunt. If only by sheer annoyance.

He wasn't going to fall for it.

"If you want to warm yourself up you could always just do jumping jacks." Tom supplied with a less sincere smirk than before.

"Yeah. Get you all brawny and handsome for when you're old enough to ship off to Germany."

Dennis greened a bit at Amy's chide. The mousy blonde went from giddy and twitchy to nervous and fumbling in the blink of an eye.

"I don't think the war will still be going on in another eight years. It can't be." Dennis offered hopefully.

The younger boy's downcast gaze and fidgeting fingers told Tom that he very much believed in the possibility of reaching adulthood to enter a world still at war. It was a vision of the future Tom shared in his heart of hearts, but one that he would not allow to ruin this otherwise perfect day for them.

"Could be." Tom admitted honestly "But I don't think you have to worry about recruiters knocking down your door."

Dennis took a moment to catch his meaning, but perked up when he did.

"What are you trying to say? That I'm not fit enough to be a soldier?"

Amy stepped up to the plate, as she was want to do every spare afternoon in the back-alley sandlot beside Wool's Orphanage, and took over teasing their especially scrawny friend.

"Please! Mr. _Butthemilkjugissoheavy_ , how are you gonna carry a rifle or drag around mewmitions."

"It's munitions, you dork!" Dennis objected. "And who's to say I plan to enlist in a combat role. Maybe I'd be a medic."

"Right. You, a medic. You went crying to Tom when I cut myself on the fence sheet. How are you going to help with gunshot wounds when you can't bear the sight of blood, hmm?"

Tom remembered that incident. The back fence of openedthe orphanage opened to a back alley the older orphans had converted to their best approximation of a sandlot. Being such cheapskates, the administrators saw fit to cover the gap with flimsy sheet metal instead of repairing it, and Amy sliced the back of her hand from finger to wrist on it.

He had almost freaked out as badly as Dennis at the sight of her injury. It was only with practiced nonchalance that he had kept his cool. That and Amy's odd obliviousness to the injury.

"Hey! The adults freaked out even harder when they saw it. I'd say I handled that pretty well. Imagine how much better I'll be when I'm bigger." Dennis countered.

That was fair.

"You'll be an even bigger baby! That or working at the home with those other bullies." Amy accused.

That was decidedly unfair.

"Nuh-uh! If any of us were to wind up working there it'd be you."

Before Tom knew what was happening Dennis gave Amy a solid push. It wasn't hard enough to push her over, but that didn't change the fact that they were standing near the edge of a cliff with a sheer drop to a craggy ocean shore.

Tom wasn't a cook, but if we were to write a recipe book this situation would be a good ingredients reference for a good ol Disaster

"No, you!" Amy roared as she shoved Dennis back.

Tom only now recovered from the sudden terror that gripped him when Dennis gave the first shove. He shook off the freezing panic and rose to his feet, a dressing down on the tip of his tongue.

He was too late. Amy slipped on the loose sand as she pushed back and slid two whole meters to the cliff edge.

Dennis, in a moment of stunning bravery, leapt forward to grab her, land probe on his stomach and grasping her wrists as she slid over the edge. Little Dennis had neither the strength to lift her up nor the weight to keep her anchored from going over, thus he began sliding over with her.

Tom, feeling like the last monkey in a barrel forming this chain, tried to grab hold of Dennis' ankles as the pair went over the edge and, missing, leapt over with them in his own stupidly brave attempt at a rescue. On the bright side, he did manage to grab her of both of them now that they were falling.

They were screaming now, all three of them, and for once Tom felt not a shred of shame at letting his fear and panic show.

None of them could rationalize what happened next, despite their most creative efforts. Soon they felt the air close in on them, squeezing them like a giant human hand made of rubber, and the next thing they knew they had landed on a rock outcropping below. Unharmed.

* * *

 **The Present:**

Granger scampered away on all fours, crushing the tiny pieces of fish and rodent bones and flinging them every which way in her rush.

"Oh, get over it. You're twelve!" Tom yelled at the suddenly indignant bookworm.

She was having none of it.

"You grabbed my chest!" Hermione complained... again.

It was taking all of his self-control not to give her a good smack to the back of her head.

"And I grabbed Colin's, and yet I don't hear him crying about it." Tom told the girl.

She had an impressive scowl.

"He's a _boy !"_ She hissed.

For his part, the camera-wed Gryffindor was showing a great deal of intelligence and backing away from the irate beaver.

"And in regards to your chest, so are you." Tom said with his most demeaning smile.

Her horrified gasp at the insult was overshadowed by the twins crashing into the pool of bones as a pile of tangled limbs. It was a position Tom assumed they found themselves in regularly, if their practiced and organized procedure for untangling themselves was an indication.

"Fred! George!"

The pair of redheads looked up from their creative rendition of ' _Head, shoulders knees and toes_ " and turned serious in an instant at the sight of Hermione in a full-blown panic.

"He groped me!"

They looked from the accusing finger to Tom and burst into simultaneous laughter. Tom scoured the memories he'd inherited from Harry, but even he had never seen the bookworm pout so adorably.

"Well Fred, I say we know our mystery man's preference." Said George.

"Quite. Clearly he is a fan of the breast, and not the butt." Said Fred.

"A boob man, through and through." They chorused.

In all honesty, Tom wasn't what the twins called, a boob man. Sure, he'd fondled a nice pair of mammaries or two during his school career, but he had other preferences in women. After all, Minerva had always been rather thin and flat, but oh boy did she look good in the lingerie.

Frilly stockings and silk pantaloons with the highest of heels to make her entire lower half look even tighter. His memory of that first time she'd given him a show was the first thing to successfully power his patronus. Later, on the day of her graduation, he gained an even happier memory to use from her.

Sadly, he couldn't use either of those memories anymore. They were tainted by the image of what Minnie looked like now. And wasn't that nightmare fuel?

In the meantime, Justin and Ron had seen fit to join them in the animal graveyard and Hermione, skipping Justin as a lost cause, clung to Ron and complained again that Tom had grabbed her by the chest.

"Yeah I know, I was there. Remember?" Ron answered obliviously.

"What, what!?" She demanded.

"When he grabbed you and Creevey and jumped there. I saw him do it. What of it?"

She sputtered for a few seconds, motioning towards her chest, Tom and Ron. Eventually the youngest (remaining) Weasley caught on and rolled his eyes.

"Grow up, will you!" He all but yelled at his friend. "We have bigger things to worry about than your misplaced sense of propriety."

And with that, she was sufficiently mortified to calm down and continue their journey. That, or she was just surprised to hear Ron use such a big word.

From there Ron lead the group deeper into the depths of Hogwarts' basement and to the wall of stone, compliments of Gilderoy Lockheart. It was up to Justin and the twins to use a combination of levitation spells and stone melting charms to transfigure an opening. It was rather impressive, forming a large archway with smoothed edges.

Tom yearned for a wand, but didn't feel like he deserved one at the moment.

A skip and a hop later had them at the serpent-decorated vault door to the chamber proper.

"Open up."

Ronald's words came out sounding like English to Tom, but the vault door opened at his command all the same.

"First try!" Fred whooped.

"Our little Ronnie will make it to the rank of dark lord by Summer's end, you mark my words."

Tom's entourage greatly resembled a pack of flamingos as they explored the chamber of secrets. Bunched together, inching forward and heads swerving each way. They "ooh'd" and "aww'd" at every statue.

Fred and George tested the water around the statues and the grime along the rocky walls for anything dark or poisonous. Beyond being bodies of still water left to rot with mold and algae they could find nothing dangerous. The corpse of Tom's deceased friend was also hugely impressive to them.

"A few air-freshening and water-purifying setups and we could turn this place into a right old water park." Fred concluded.

"Don't you think the giant dead Basilisk in the middle of the cavern would be a bit of a sore point for customers?" Justin asked as he toed said Basilisk corpse.

Tom felt his skin prickle in anger at the treatment of his first, and only friend. Then he realized his first and only friend was a murderous thousand year old serpent and swore to never share that depressing fact.

"Nonsense!" George exclaimed. "Once we sell off all of the useful bits we can string up the skeleton to the ceiling as a decorational piece."

Deep breaths Tom. Deep breaths.

"I can do you one better. Carve a lion statue into the wall above the entrance and put the corpse in it's mouth." Said Ron.

Must. Not. Kill.

"Throw a springboard on top of Salazar's fat, balding head and the pool under his mouth would be the main attraction." Said Creevey.

"Ooh! I like that idea. What say you, Minerva?"

They all froze in place at the sound of the new, wispy voice.

"Quite tempting, headmaster. While I'm sure I am more than up to the taste of making these fantasies come true, I would be more interested in adding some glisseo charms to the pipe entrance and making it into a water slide." Minnie answered Dumbledore.

A tirade of choice expletives was exchanged between the students, Tom very much included, with little care for loss of house points.

The headmaster and the woman who, apparently, became deputy headmistress in recent years smiled at their expense. The sallow, greasy-haired man at their back seemed less amused. Much more disheveled. And like he was in desperate need of a shave.

Dumbledore clapped.

"Now now, you had a lovely adventure, but you all really must return to your treatment. It doesn't take an eye as trained as mine to see you all buckling under the pain in your joints." The headmaster said smilingly.

It was true, they winced with every movement. Those still petrified buts of meant and bone in their bodies still losing damage

His compatriots groaned in objection, all the while their bodies betrayed them and they trudged along to the entrance all the same.

"Wait!" Even Tom was surprised by the objection coming from his mouth.

All eyes turned to him.

"Please, sir, they came here looking for answers. Looking for closure. Let them get their fill of the thing that almost killed them. Let them do their investigating. Let them find closure for... Those two they lost. Let them cope."

Dumbledore schooled his features to one of calm consideration, the one only he could pull off. As he glanced between Tom and his six companions. Nobody made a sound, until.

"Very well. You may stay, and under our supervision, conduct your investigation."

The others whooped and got to work. Tom absent-mindedly noted the spells Fred and George took to casting as the greasy-haired man approached him. Hair, skin and blood detection charms. Spells used by crime scene investigators. Unsurprisingly, they got results near the large ink stand near the...

"Here!" The man, Snape, shoved a vial of something into Tom's hands.

It was a bile restoring potion. The last of his regimen until he was good as made to thank the man only to realize that the potions master was uncomfortably close. Close enough to get a really good look at.

He looked like shit. Utter shit.

His eyes were sunken in the way sleep deprivation does to a man. It couldn't have been less than four days since he'd last shaved by the state of his face and his eyes were bloodshot. The smell of alcohol and unwashedness came off of him in waves.

He barely noticed that Snape was studying his own face, gazing deeply into his eyes as if he might find something there. Tom could even see the moment Snape realized he wasn't going to find whatever he was looking for and, for a split second, he looked on the verge of tears.

Tom blinked and the cold exterior of the potions teacher he had so many memories of hating was back. A smear and billowing of cloaks later and Snape stormed away.

What a strange man. Tom took his potion and waited for the other students to finish here, then returned to his house arrest.

* * *

 **Notes** :

I know. It's been a long time. I sort of abandoned this story in favor of ones that actually got reviews, but I'm back and writing more consistently for all of my stories. I'm writing two-three hours a day now on one story or another.

So I can promise you MUCH faster updates now.

I need a **beta**.

If you're interested, point out my mistakes in a review or pm.


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